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Add to Preferred SourcesWHO welcomes preliminary results about dexamethasone use for COVID-19 patients, EU supports with €60 million to the pandemic in the Horn of Africa, and COVID-19 impact on migrant smuggling and human trafficking. Here is what you missed from last week’s headlines in the international development sector:
COVID-19 impact on migrant smuggling and human trafficking
COVID-19, and measures being taken by countries to control its spread, are impacting crime around the world, including migrant smuggling and human trafficking.
While some of the preventive measures have effectively hindered certain criminal opportunities in the short-term, smugglers, and traffickers, as well as their victims, have sought and found ways to overcome them.
Migrant smuggling and human trafficking are particularly affected by geopolitical and socio-economic factors which vary greatly by region and in the ways they drive vulnerable communities in those regions to migrate.
The COVID-19 pandemic is and will continue, influencing these factors across the globe. The economic consequences will significantly impact peoples’ desire and ability to migrate, as well as the incentive and opportunities for criminals to profit from illegal migration which is also expected to increase.
WHO welcomes preliminary results about dexamethasone use in treating critically ill COVID-19 patients
The World Health Organization (WHO) welcomes the initial clinical trial results from the United Kingdom (UK) that show dexamethasone, a corticosteroid, can be lifesaving for patients who are critically ill with COVID-19.
For patients on ventilators, the treatment was shown to reduce mortality by about one third, and for patients requiring only oxygen, mortality was cut by about one fifth, according to preliminary findings shared with WHO.
The benefit was only seen in patients seriously ill with COVID-19 and was not observed in patients with milder disease.
“This is the first treatment to be shown to reduce mortality in patients with COVID-19 requiring oxygen or ventilator support,” said Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General. “This is great news and I congratulate the Government of the UK, the University of Oxford, and the many hospitals and patients in the UK who have contributed to this lifesaving scientific breakthrough.”
EU supports with €60 million a regional response to the pandemic in the Horn of Africa
The EU has announced a €60 million package to help tackle the health and socio-economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, in support of the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), a regional organisation with eight member states, in its mandate to coordinate national responses to the COVID-19 pandemic in the Horn of Africa.
The programme will focus on vulnerable groups, including migrants, refugees, internally displaced persons and cross-border communities and deliver medical equipment, including more than 8.5 million items of personal protective equipment. It will also help ensure borders and critical supply chains are safe for trade and promote digital solutions to monitor the crisis.
Commissioner for International Partnerships, Jutta Urpilainen, said: ”The programme will help mitigate the impact of the pandemic by providing coordinated, coherent, and comprehensive actions across the region. It will be implemented in collaboration not only with partner countries but also with UN agencies, illustrating the benefits of a joint multilateral response. We want to ensure that no one is left behind. This is why we will make sure it reaches the most vulnerable communities and includes measures to fight gender-based violence. Nearly 430,000 people, predominantly women and children, will receive necessary basic care including vaccinations whilst almost 570,000 people will receive critical water, sanitation and hygiene supplies and services, in addition to reaching more than 1.6 million people through awareness campaigns to help prevent the spread of the virus.”
DevelopmentAid Editorials
Coughing? Then you are not allowed in Yemen hospitals
While in most developed countries, you see people with face masks everywhere and ambulances are called at the first sign of COVID -19, there is a parallel life elsewhere the world – for example, Yemen. “Hospitals don’t accept anyone with a cough,” said Noor, a journalist in the southern port city of Aden, Yemen.
So, what do you do in Yemen if you feel ill? Stay at home and pray that the symptoms will disappear by themselves? Pray that you will not end up like the father and son from a family in Yemen who also had a cough and fever and are now both dead? Noor, in her mid-twenties and otherwise healthy, luckily recovered quickly. Her official story now is that she had “dengue or malaria”. Maybe she even had corona. “And we’re not sure either, because you can’t get tested.”
In Yemen, the poorest country in the Arab world, corona can spread “faster, further and with more deadly consequences” than anywhere else in the world, the UN warned in April 2020. COVID-19 represents yet another plot twist in a long-running drama: a civil war that has continued for five years, as many as three different ruling parties, one of whom, the southern separatists, gained power in Aden in the middle of the corona epidemic in May. More than 24 million people depend on aid organizations for their existence. The previous health catastrophe, a cholera outbreak that took more than 3880 lives especially among young children, has not been forgotten here.
Here’s what else has happened
UNICEF: The first batch of 10,000 COVID-19 tests arrived in Sana’a on a UNICEF-chartered plane, to increase the COVID-19 testing capacity amid the rapid increase of cases in Yemen. An additional shipment of 8,000 tests is expected to arrive in Aden in the coming days.
EBRD and Oxfam: The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and Oxfam, one of the world’s leading charities, are joining forces to strengthen the communities where they work and to promote sustainable civil societies in light of the coronavirus pandemic.
EIB: The European Investment Bank, the EU’s long-term financing institution, has signed a EUR 150 million finance contract with the company SMS IDE Ltd targeting the design, financing, construction and operation of a seawater desalination plant using reverse osmosis technology in Sorek, Israel.
Reports
COVID-19 could lead to permanent loss in learning and trillions of dollars in lost earnings
School closures due to COVID-19 have left most students on the planet out of school – 1.6 billion students at the peak in April 2020. This global shock to all education systems is being followed by a deep recession.
Without remedial action when students start returning to school, a new World Bank report estimates a loss of $10 trillion dollars in earnings over time for this generation of students, and countries will be driven off-track to achieving their Learning Poverty goals.
Read the report: Simulating COVID-19 impacts on learning and schooling outcomes: A set of global estimates.
New IAEA reports on response to the COVID–19 pandemic
As the world grapples with COVID‑19, the IAEA has adjusted ways of working to ensure its operations continue with minimal disruptions under the extraordinary circumstances.
At the meeting of the Board of Governors, IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi presented three reports on the Agency’s COVID‑19 related work. The reports on support to Member States in the fight against the pandemic, support to nuclear and radiation facility operators and safeguards implementation during the crisis, have also been made available to the public.
The Report on safeguards implementation during the COVID-19 Pandemic discusses measures taken by the IAEA to continue its verification work to make sure that nuclear material and technology are not diverted from peaceful use.
Events
Pledging summit | Global Goal: Unite for Our Future
?27 June 2020
Pledging summit
The pledging marathon that started on 4 May will now see the launch of a new campaign with the international advocacy organisation Global Citizen, “Global Goal: Unite For Our Future”, that will culminate in a Global Pledging Summit. Together with the international advocacy organisation Global Citizen, the Commission will step up the mobilisation of funding to enable the world to overcome this pandemic and avoid another.
Virtual | IV Brussels Conference on Supporting the Future of Syria and the Region
?30 June 2020 ? 10:00 – 17:45
Virtual
The European Union and the United Nations will co-chair the fourth Brussels Conference on “Supporting the future of Syria and the region”. In light of the necessary social distancing measures, the Conference will be held in a virtual format.